(1673 Grant Road property near Quamichan Lake)
Quamichan Lake property owner seeking development approval has donated to campaigns of three councillors
North Cowichan Mayor Douglas has proposed new policies aimed at greater transparency and impartiality
A Quamichan Lake property owner who donated $1,000 to Becky Hogg’s byelection campaign is before North Cowichan council on Wednesday seeking to develop a seven-lot subdivision.
A review of Elections BC records by sixmountains.ca shows that the $1,000 donation from Margo Young was among $10,250 in total contributions to Hogg in the April byelection.
Hogg, the co-owner of a Duncan hair salon, won the byelection by a 67-vote margin.
(Becky Hogg at 2025 byelection all-candidates meeting.)
Records also show that Young donated $300 each to Bruce Findlay and Mike Caljouw during the 2022 election campaign. Both were elected.
Young is applying for an Official Community Plan (OCP) amendment and rezoning related to 1.24 hectares of a 3.2-hectare property at 1673 Grant Road near Quamichan Lake.
If approved, the maximum allowable housing units would increase to 36 from the current 14.
Municipal staff are recommending against approval, while 68 residents of the nearby Trumpeter Pointe residential area have signed a petition opposing the development.
Young’s property is currently zoned Residential Rural (R1) and is located just outside North Cowichan’s Urban Containment Boundary (UCB) as defined in the OCP approved in 2022.
She is asking that the 1.24 hectares be included within the UCB and rezoned to Residential Restricted (R2).
Under Bill 44, R2 zoning could allow up to four units per lot, warns a staff report. “For the purposes of infrastructure planning, North Cowichan must assume the maximum density arising from the zoning change.…”
The staff report added: “The whole purpose of defining a growth boundary is to encourage development and densification within it, and to prevent it from outside of it. The fact that the scale of development in this case is relatively small offers no justification to depart from the policy and expand the UCB.”
(Read the full staff report: https://pub-northcowichan.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=20680 )
(The Trumpeter Pointe petition: https://pub-northcowichan.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=20669 )
Mayor Rob Douglas has proposed new policies aimed at “greater transparency and impartiality” related to developers and council.
Douglas recommends: details of developer donations to council members be published on the municipal website; council members recuse themselves from decisions related to campaign contributors; meetings with developers or lobbyists be disclosed.
(More reading: https://www.sixmountains.ca/article/58ee5102-9370-4fa8-9a13-4c103cfbc77d )
On Sept. 3, 2025, council voted to refer the Mayor's motion to staff for further clarification, including on the issues of what constitutes a developer and a meeting, and whether the policy should only apply to developers with active applications before council.
Only Councillor Tek Manhas opposed the motion.
BC prohibits corporations, unions and organizations from making political contributions and from reimbursing individuals for making contributions. But individuals can still make contributions out of their own pockets.
Council candidates must declare campaign contributions. But councillors are not required to recuse themselves if they do not personally benefit when a developer donor comes before council.
In 2015, then-mayor of North Cowichan, Jon Lefebure, recused himself from a zoning amendment issue due to a $200 campaign donation.
In 2021, the BC Supreme Court ruled in a Township of Langley case that the acceptance of a campaign contribution from a developer to an elected local government official did not by itself establish that the official had a monetary interest in that developer’s matters before council.
(Read more: https://sms.bc.ca/2021/01/campaign-contributions-from-developers-with-in-stream-development-applications-held-not-to-create-a-conflict-of-interest/ )
In recent years, several other BC municipalities have raised the issue of developer donations to council members, including North Vancouver District, Port Moody and Colwood.
(Cowichan Valley Citizen editorial: More local government transparency certainly wouldn't hurt: https://www.cowichanvalleycitizen.com/opinion/editorial-more-local-government-transparency-certainly-wouldnt-hurt-8244130 )
Neither Young nor Hogg responded to a request for comment.
Subscribe free to sixmountains.ca. More than 87,000 unique visitors.
Please share this article and consider a donation.
(Have a comment for council? Email council@northcowichan.ca)
— Larry Pynn, Sept. 29, 2025
